29th Street Capital, a privately held real estate investment firm, has acquired The Cloisters Apartments in Louisville, Ky., for an unspecified price. The 39-unit property is about a mile east of downtown Louisville in the Butchertown neighborhood and near the proposed site of the Louisville City Football Club stadium.

Back in the 1980s, the property was an adaptive reuse. The Cloisters was once the chapel and convent for the Ursuline Academy of Immaculate Conception, but about 30 years ago the structure was converted to apartments and renovated to meet housing code requirements.

The buyer is no stranger to the market, with the Cloisters representing its third acquisition in the Louisville area. 29th Street Capital acquired 16 multifamily assets over the past 12 months in a variety of markets, and says it will continue to pursue additional opportunities nationwide.

A Growth Market

“The city of Louisville is in a transitional phase as it continues to grow and attract a younger demographic,” Adam Miller, 29th Street Capital’s senior vice president of acquisitions for the Southeast, who characterizes the new stadium as another marker of growth. “The city is working with the state government to help fund the $200 million Louisville City Football Club stadium project.”

Louisville has added more than 15,000 jobs metro-wide each year since 2014, and the area’s unemployment has been consistently below 5 percent in recent years, adding to local demand for apartments. According to Marcus & Millichap’s latest report on the market, job gains are increasing the rate of household formations and bolstering Louisville’s millennial base.

With demand drivers in place, the metro awaits the delivery of 2,800 units in 2018, the highest level since 2000. The influx of product will probably push vacancies up in the local apartment market this year, but not by a vast amount, the company posited.